Today an image heavy post, with a sparse poem to accompany. In this case, I worked on the poem first, and then finished the image. Sometimes, certain words just pop out. In my case, it was “take care.”
Also, never underestimate the incredible power of white paint piled against yellowed pages. Continue reading “The Interrogation of the Ways”
Forewarn: Physically uncomfortable as I began this post, I finally removed the snorkel and umbrella from the chair I have been sitting on too long. Which is to say, my youngest son is coughing on the sofa where he has been sleeping for the past 14 hours, the cat is screaming out the window at the oldest two for walking outside without her, and I have probably had less than 5 hours of sleep (nightly, not total) for the past week. Being an insomniac, this last is not really news.
THE SURVIVAL OF THE FISH KING matters now more than ever. If this post is goofy, it is because I am barely here.
Sometimes your art will live in a safe and insular world and sometimes that world will have to open up and acknowledge the outside world too.
This past week has been grief filled. I have often written, in essay or poem, of the unwelcome privilege I have been afforded by the very authority that took the life of a good man, a neighbor. A man who shopped at the same grocery store as me and sat in the same traffic and clipped the same coupons.
At first, this seemed impossible. But as I stared at it and wondered why it insisted on being so boring, words began to appear that I had somehow missed at first.
Words like SPIRIT, LIGHT, RULE, and RABBET (a step-shaped recess cut along the edge or in the face of a piece of wood) came out of nowhere and suddenly there was some magic in that list. More importantly, there was an invitation for more.
This is one of those poems that threatens to be too insular, too in the writer’s own head to make sense to others, too abstract. I’m all right with that danger. To me, the fish king is a real thing and this is its poem.
And since I have, as usual, worked ahead… I know it will return.
Number 7 is about image and sun and finding your own way and Bob Marley.
Number 7 is the place where you should let your hair down, loosen your belt, drink a root beer, and free yourself from whatever preconceived notions you hold toward poetry, art, and writing.
Here is a photo of my work space. This is a piano bench. My piano bench does not contain music because I play by ear, or by finger, as shall be explained after the jump. Continue reading “Celestial Navigation”
What do you call a poem without words? A picture poem.
I considered putting words on the page but decided the absence said enough. To be honest, I am confident that I could read this poem aloud if I was forced to. Certainly, I could speak to why I believe in it.
Here are some explanations for this piece. Continue reading “Build Your Own Boat”
That is not a typo. That is the name of a line of boats. Down in the basement of a local bookstore this weekend, my sons grabbed a 1984 copy of Wooden Boat and a 2007 copy of Artforum for collage. Thus began a new project. And with the new project, a direction (finally) for this blog.
I’ll document the progress here as I begin with these two magazines creating a page by page, no editing allowed, collection of “picture poems” (my youngest’s term for collage), erasure, and poetry experiments.
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